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Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) [REVIEW]

Nope, certainly no Michael Myers to be found in this one! Instead, we get a different kind of terrifying tale. Some dude gets attacked by some other dude in a suit, but he survives long enough to get to the hospital. At the hospital, he keeps saying, “they’re gonna kill us all”, and eventually, he is killed in the hospital by a dude in a suit. One of the doctors investigates the man’s arrival, along with the man’s daughter, only to end up in the small town of Santa Mira, California, home of the Silver Shamrock Novelties factory. They make masks, and with Halloween approaching, are clearly very busy sending masks all across the country, each one with their emblem embedded into the back of it. After further investigating, the doctor, played by Tom Atkins, discovers that the men in suits are actually androids. The owner of Silver Shamrock Novelties is trying to make Halloween return to the original Gaelic festival of Samhain, and claims that every one of the masks has a piece of Stonehenge embedded in it. A commercial that has been repeatedly airing on TV and radio is the key, and on Halloween night, a special broadcast is sent across the country that activities the powers in the masks, causing the wearer to die a gruesome death. Tom Atkins is able to get some of the stations to shut off the broadcast, but the film ends as he is screaming into the phone for the final broadcasting company to turn off the commercial.

Careful, kids! Those things might eat your damn heads off!

HOLY SHIT, WHY DON’T MORE PEOPLE TALK ABOUT THIS MOVIE? I get it, Michael Myers isn’t involved at all, and every other film in the franchise features him extensively. Not having been alive in 1982, I can really only look back on the franchise, and see how this movie could be considered weird. From what I heard, John Carpenter was hoping this could be the future of the Halloween franchise, with every subsequent film having been a different macabre tale centered around Halloween. That makes so much more fucking sense! I mean, Michael only attacks on Halloween? What the fuck is Dr. Loomis doing the other 364 days of the year? Maybe this movie isn’t for everybody, but it’s really creepy and more of just an unsettling feeling, rather than being downright scary. John Carpenter was involved in creating the soundtrack, and one of the best moments is when the owner of the novelty company explains what he’s doing to the doctor, who is restrained, looks him in the eyes, says “Happy Halloween”, and then the iconic theme starts playing. FUCK YES! This movie definitely has more of the Creepshow/Children of the Corn kind of vibe, which I really liked. I also thought it was really cool the way they tied it into the origins of Halloween in a relatively subtle way, by having the emblem of the company be the shamrock. I wish the series could have continued down this path, but I guess I’ll just watch Trick ‘r Treata few more times, since that’s more along the lines of Season of the Witch than anything else in the Halloween franchise.

11 responses to “Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) [REVIEW]”

Wait, so you hated pretty much every Elm St movie but this gets 4 stars?!?!?! Makes no sense I say. This is one of the very rare movie that I watched about an hour of on DVD and then fast forwarded through the last half hour to see the ending. It was pretty much unwatchable. I think Rampaige must have stolen your password and inserted her review of Dogs Play Sports or whatever movie she watched last night.

Compared to the standard Michael Myers trying to find someone who doesn’t want to be found and slowly creeping after them, yes, this was awesome. Although, I never said “this movie should have been longer!”, and can admit it might have worked better as part of an anthology, but that’s just me! And after all, this blog is called “The Wolfman Cometh”, and not “The Wolfman’s brother cometh to whine about what he’d do if he ran Hollywood”.

I totally agree. The first two Halloween movies were cool, but after that it was just time for a change. The whole concept Carpenter had to make a new Halloween-themed movie every year after Halloween III was brilliant and I still really wish that someone would do this. Most movies that take place on or right around the night of Halloween are slasher movies. Its been done to death. Season Of The Witch was way more creative and much better than that because of the depth and originality it had. This movie is one of my favorite movies of all-time and I don’t care if most people disagree or not. I’m glad to see that someone else appreciates this amazing movie. I’m really glad that I stumbled across page in a random Google search!

Thanks man! That was my first viewing of the movie and I loved what they did. I actually just saw Tom Atkins at a convention over the weekend and during the Q & A mentioned how when he saw Halloween III in theaters, he remembered a bunch of disappointed people leaving the theater, and Tom Atkins responded with “Tough shit”. Feel free to stop by any time.